UM system to recommend 5.8 percent increase at MU for tuition and required fees
The UM system will recommend the Board of Curators raise tuition and required fees 5.8 percent at MU for the 2011-2012 school year.
This raise will affect in-state undergraduate students.
Fees are being decoupled for the first time across the four-campus system, and the average suggested increase is 5.5 percent. At University of Missouri — St. Louis, the suggested raise is 4.7 percent, and a 6.6 percent raise is being suggested at Missouri University of Science and Technology. The University of Missouri — Kansas City is recommending at 4.8 percent increase. This is to better reflect the four institution’s individual markets.
The increases would amount to an average cost of $8,917 at MU, a raise of $488. However, the release states that if grant aid increases at the same rate as is did from fiscal year 2008 to 2010, the average student would pay $4,211. Students from families with a total income of less than $40,000 would pay an average of $988, though in some cases less with additional funds available for books, supplies and living expenses. To minimize this impact, the release states the university plans to reinvest 20 percent of the increase into financial aid for those students.
“We wish we could continue to hold the line on tuition and fees as we have for the past two years,” interim UM system President Steve Owens said in a news release. “But even with the increases we will recommend to the curators, the proposed 7 percent cut in state appropriations will leave about a $42 million shortfall for the University - and that’s after we cut an additional $11.3M in efficiencies that we identified in the process of planning for next year’s budget.”
The curators will make the final decision regarding tuition at Thursday and Friday’s meetings at MU. If approved, the increases will be instated this summer.
"At a time when Missouri seeks to grow its economy and depends on an educated workforce and more jobs, and America faces intensifying global competition, we urge Missourians to carefully consider the importance of investing in education, and viewing it as a solution, not a cost," Owens said.